1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed generally to a system and method for delivering audio and video programming content to a remote location.
2. Description of the Background
In facilities such as, for example, health clubs, restaurants, waiting rooms, retail stores, and other public and private environments, it is often desirable to deliver entertainment and advertisements to the patrons of the facility during a visit. For example, many health clubs have television monitors and speaker systems positioned throughout the facility to broadcast network, or cable television signals and music from a radio signal or from a pre-recorded source such as from a compact disc player.
Systems currently exist which deliver entertainment to facilities such as waiting rooms and elevators. For example, the network news channel CNN is broadcast on television monitors in airport waiting rooms and in hotel elevators. Such systems do not deliver customized content, but rather deliver a common broadcast signal. There also exists systems in which a video server is placed at a location so that video and audio content may be played back through television monitors. Such servers typically have software which determines, with manual intervention, a playlist of the content. For example, the servers could generate a playlist randomly based on the content stored on the server. When such servers are inexpensive servers, they generally cannot reliably perform the task of playing content because they do not have the processing power to generate a playlist and play the content. More expensive and powerful servers may be used, but the relative cost of such servers generally outweighs the utility of delivering content. Furthermore, such systems do not generally allow for the customization of the content stored on the servers.
There also exist methods for syndicating advertisements. For example, television advertisements are often produced for affiliated entities (e.g. entities selling the same products or services) and distributed to multiple regions of the United States. Local advertisers add customized identifiers and/or voice-overs to the advertisements and, thus, the same commercial is used in multiple regions. For example, a car manufacturer may produce an advertisement that depicts a certain car model. The advertisement is then distributed to multiple geographic regions where taglines for local car dealers are added to the advertisement. Likewise, radio advertisements are often produced and distributed to multiple regions of the United States. Local advertisers add customized audio and broadcast the advertisements locally. Such schemes do not allow for advertisers to target specific facilities or households with customized advertisements. Furthermore, such schemes do not allow for targeting of specific advertising categories using multiple advertisements having common theme-specific content and customized advertiser identifiers. Also, such schemes do not allow for delivering the advertisements via a computer network to targeted facilities. Also, such schemes are not suited to deliver advertisements for use by entities that are not affiliated with other entities or advertisers that use the same advertisements.
Thus, there is a need for a system and method of delivering entertainment and advertising content to facilities which use relatively inexpensive playback systems that may be programmed from a remote location to play back the content in a desired order. Furthermore, there is a need for a system and method of delivering content to facilities which allow for the customization of all or a portion of the content.